Choosing our Adoption Agency

In March we turned in our application to Celebrate Children International adoption agency. Just getting to that decision had been a long time coming with LOTS of prayer. We tend to always take the "adventurous" route to do things which sometimes means we move quickly. What many of you may or may not know is that LOTS of research goes into what appears to others to be "impulsive."

At the beginning of this journey, on the day we both said we were going to adopt, my husband shared with me about some money he had been "hoarding" to buy a new bow and arrow. He knew it wasn't something that I would agree that he needed so he felt the need to "save" the money for it and buy it without telling me. For a couple of months everytime he had any extra cash he threw it in his nightstand drawer. For some reason though he really felt that he wasn't supposed to buy the bow. Everytime he tried, things would come up and prevent him from doing so. The day that we both said yes to adoption, he told me about the money and said that he felt God was telling him to use it for our application fee to the agency. This was a sacrifice for him because he REALLY wanted that bow!

The bow Brent wanted to buy.

It took a few weeks of research and lots of praying before we narrowed down our search to about 3-4 agencies. We liked them all and felt like we were over thinking the decision. I mean is it really that big of a deal? A new friend told us to be very prayerful about this decision because it would ultimately lead us to the kids God had chosen for us so, yes, it is a big deal. We were blessed to be able to attend the "Adopted for Life" conference at the end of February in Louisville, KY. We were hoping that we would have some sort of revelation there and know what agency to go with. Sure enough on the first day, while visiting the booths, we met a lady who several people had given me the name of to contact for our home study. We asked her if she had any recommendations for an agency and she said she did. As it turned out it was one of the ones we had on our list. Have you ever had a moment where you felt that you are in God's presence and know that He is at work? This was one of those moments. We left and felt sure that God had used her to lead us to CCI.

When we returned home the next day, Brent went up and decided to count the money he had been saving. After all, we were going to use it for our app fee. Of the three to four agencies we had on our short list, only one had an application fee of $250. Guess how much money Brent had collected??? You guessed it....$250 exactly...not a penny more! The cool part of the story is that we didn't "need" the money to pay for our application fee. We had it in the bank. What is cool is that Brent listened when God told him to use that money he had saved to buy a bow and arrow and use it for this instead. Because Brent listened, we had confirmation that we had chosen correctly! What are the odds that after a few months of adding to (and occasionally spending) the money he had saved that it would total EXACTLY $250!

We have had so many moments like the ones above that I may never be able to journal it all. What I do know is that God is in this adoption! We have learned so much about what the Bible says about adoption and how God holds it very close to His heart. Without it we would not have the gospel. The prophesy that Christ would be from the house and line of David was only fulfilled through the adoption of Jesus into Joseph's family. As Christians, through the blood Christ shed on the cross, we are adopted into the family of God and are now "heirs according to the promise" (Galatians3:29).

In my next post I will share some other things that have happened just this week as we have frantically put together our dossier. There is no doubt God has been carrying us through as He has literally "parted the Red Sea"